Dr. S. W. N. Bahaar
Heavens lie at thy feet,
I wonder
Dear Mother
What secrets might
Your embrace conceal.
If I were to say that you are the spinal cord of our family that would be a gross understatement. And if I were to say that you are the nucleus of our family, it won’t do justice to your cardinal contribution either. I feel too small to write about you whose status has been elevated by Allah SWT Himself. Yet my balky pen attempts to put a fraction of my thoughts and emotions into characters. While the world was celebrating Mother’s Day, I was struggling to scribble few lines in your awe and honour. My vocabulary seems to have gone bankrupt. I toil to find any parallel or any similitude to describe your pre-eminence. Your stature is ineffable. You are like the atmosphere; invisible yet indispensable. You are like gravity; inconspicuous yet imperative. You are what sun is to the solar system. You are what soil is to trees. You complete us Mamma. It was only when I settled down to put some words into order so as to celebrate your pivotal role in my life that I perceived how fundamental you have been to my existence. May be this lockdown made me realize that while all else that surrounded me was a variable, you stuck around as a constant. While the world and circumstances always conspired to let me down, you unfailingly toiled to make me stand tall. You laughed with me and you cried with me. You stayed awake with me during my sleepless nights. You didn’t even catch a few winks after putting me to sleep and continued to monitor me over. My slightest of mumbles would be enough to unsettle you in your deepest slumbers after a tiresome day of managing me along with your job and family affairs. As an infant when I wetted the bed, you shifted to the soiled side and snuggled me towards the dry and warm side. Your dreams are still entwined in my dreams. While all this time I was busy in my world you stood silently like the sun powering my needs, beliefs and self reliance. Since you provided everything without being asked for, your existence was taken for granted just like we do with the ecosystem services – vital yet free of cost, hence ignored. Being always busy in myself; my studies, my exams, my grades, my degrees, my interviews, my jobs, my married life, my family, my kids, I seldom paused a moment to notice the growing silvers in your hair and the wrinkles on your face. May be I was too busy in figuring out my own life and in doing so I don’t remember where I left you out. While I was putting my life in order and moving up the rungs of life, I hardly took a note of the steadily growing prescription stacks and drugs that continued to make your dosette box gather mass. While your frequency of clinic visits grew so did the pace and frustration of my life. I was busy proving myself to the indifferent world and you were busy supporting me and my priorities without a dash of complaint. The more you needed me the more I drifted away. Whenever I enquired about your rising hypertension or high blood sugar, you dismissed it with a casual laugh arguing that it happened just because of some cheat meals. I cajoled my heart into believing it because I couldn’t afford to hear otherwise. Whenever I asked about your health, you said everything was fine and advised me to concentrate on my own life. Every time you said so I agreed and continued my cribbing forgetting that I needed to slow down and listen to your unsaid longings. I continued living my life as usual largely ignorant of your central position in my life. Even after my marriage you never let yourself off the hook. Retirement was never on your mind. While I was away from your home, your heart and mind were always engrossed in me. When I became a mother your motherhood got a renewal. You let your needs take a back seat once again so that you can calm my nerves during my upheavals. While you patiently led me through the uncharted territory of my motherhood, I began exploring a new side to my persona. When you were helping me grow from strength to strength, your own frailties needed some attention. You continued ignoring yourself while fortifying my grit and enduring my temper tantrums. You continued being you and I continued being me.
Although Old Age Homes are not a dime a dozen sighting in our valley but the fast eroding familial values are pushing our elderly to the wall.
Since my childhood you and Dad have been my heroes. Your ageing was always a challenge for me. The last time I had to struggle myself into acceptance about your growing age was when you retired from government services. Eventually I was again immersed in my busy life so the feeling sinked in gradually till it became the new normal. It is said that you will never understand what being a mom is like until you actually become one. True that. I would have never known the depth of my mother’s love for me had I not been a mother myself. My little sunshine made me realize how important I am to my parents and vice versa. Only after my new found motherhood could I gauge the magnanimity of the infinite aquifer of love a mother stores in her heart. The only arithmetic she knows is the continuous multiplication of her ever abounding love and affection. All mothers are the same. They function on the universal principle of unconditional love and compassion for children. After donning the motherhood cape my heart found new realms of love and affection. I could now relate to all mothers of the world irrespective of their races and religions. It began making sense why suddenly I had become more sensitive and touchy towards all children. Now I understood why every night after I lull my baby to sleep in a cosy cot, I am reminded of the millions of homeless mothers out there in open struggling to keep their babies warm in the coldest of nights and rocking them to sleep trying to cover them with anything from newspapers to their head scarves. A pang cuts through my heart for I know while motherhood bestows upon us the strongest of virtues, simultaneously it becomes one of our biggest weaknesses. I cry my heart out for commiseration is all I can offer! Every year the 2nd Sunday of May is celebrated as the International Mothers Day. Its history dates back to 1872 when it was celebrated as Mothers Peace Day. However, in 1914 the US President Woodrow Wilson designated the 2nd Sunday of May to be celebrated as Mothers Day. This day is celebrated in order to acknowledge and honour the principal role played by mothers in shaping the course of a family and their relentless love and affection for their children in particular and towards the society in general. In the West this day is marked by showering mothers with flowers and gifts and other small acts of love which help the children express their love and respect for their mothers. Ours being a conservative society doesn’t believe much in expressing love. I hardly remember a day having expressed my love and concern for my mother extrovertly. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t love her. She is in my DNA. Loving her is an innate attribute. Ours is not an umbilical bond merely, our souls are one. It’s just that I feel awkward while attempting a metamorphosis of feelings into words. It may be because of my natural reserve and coyness towards the parents which I feel is the essence of our relationship. It is sacred so I allow it to be as it is. In this part of world mothers don’t say “I love you” to their kids, they simply say “Zoov Vandai” or “Balai Lagai”. This is Kashmir’s equivalent of “I love you’’. The trend of celebrating Mothers Day in Kashmir hasn’t picked yet. May be we didn’t find any valid reason for doing so because the role and sacrifices of a mother are taken as a rule of thumb or as an inherent practice that is considered a fundamental right of any household and doesn’t need any acknowledgement or gratitude. While some schools of thought may brand it as an innovation borrowed from the West, other may feign a complete indifference. According to a study more phone calls are made on Mother’s Day than any other day of the year. Does celebrating 1 day out of the annual 365 days do justice to the expression of gratitude towards our mothers who work tirelessly day in and day out, in health and in sickness, in cold and in heat, in youth and in senescence without taking a day off? During day they cook for us, do the laundry and the dishes, take care of the needs of entire family and at night supplicate for the better future of their children. Shouldn’t we celebrate every day as a mothers’ day? What is the need for earmarking a particular day for commemoration? How long shall we need a particular day to remind ourselves to take some time from our busy schedule and spend time with our parents especially mothers? What about the rest of days? Out of the total 1440 minutes of a day, managing a 5 minute call to our parents isn’t a big deal. How unfortunate that when the children take to their wings, they focus all their efforts towards flying higher and higher without looking back towards their parents who crave for their attention. Our society is not new to tales where elderly parents die a lonely death while their children are settled in far off countries realizing their dreams of an ideal life. Although Old Age Homes are not a dime a dozen sighting in our valley but the fast eroding familial values are pushing our elderly to the wall. While cerebrating over the issue, I recollected some verses of Holy Quran where Allah SWT says, “And We have enjoined on you to be dutiful and kind to your parents. In pain did your mother bear you, And in pain did she give birth to you’’ (46:15). On the day when each soul shall be held accountable for ones deeds, what would be my response to Almighty’s call? While musing, a shiver ran down my spine and a couplet of Mirza Ghalib crossed my mind:
Aata hai daag-e-hasrat-e-dil ka shumaar yaad
Mujh se mere gunah ka hisaab aye Khuda na maang!
(The author is Assistant Professor at J & K Higher Education Department. Views are her own, [email protected])
